This invention is a method of making a pasta filata cheese. Pasta filata refers to a type of cheese having a plastic pliable homogeneous stringy structure and includes such cheeses as becchi, caciocavallo, mandarini, mozzarella, pizza cheese, provatura, provole, provolette, provolone, provolone giganti, salame and scamorze cheeses. This inventive method can use equipment and methods typically used in making processed cheese, and produces a cheese having all of the characteristics of a traditional pasta filata cheese in improved yields and with reduced waste by-products.
Natural cheese is conventionally prepared from a milk product, such as whole milk 10, skim milk 12, nonfat dry milk, cream 14 or combinations thereof as illustrated in the FIG. 1 Natural Cheese Flow. The milk product is pasteurized 16, acidified, usually with lactic acid, and a bacterial culture 18 is added to the cheese vats 20. Adding a milk-coagulating enzyme coagulates the acidified milk. The coagulum, referred to as curd, is blended to a particulate and heated to separate whey from the curd. After separation of whey, as in matting machines 22, the curd is salted 24, conducted to the cheese towers 26 and formed into solid blocks of cheese 28. The cheese cures in temperature-controlled conditions 30 to achieve the desired texture and flavor.
Cheeses designated as pasta filata (plastic curd) are Italian-type cheeses. Broadly speaking, pasta filata cheeses are traditionally prepared by draining whey from the curd, immersing the curd in hot water or hot whey, and working, stretching and molding the cheese in its plastic condition. The molded cheese then traditionally chills in salt brine. Pasta filata cheese is produced initially in the same manner as conventional cheddar-type cheese. It can be manufactured from skim or whole milk, or mixtures thereof. The milk must be pasteurized. A starter organism, such as mixed heat resistant lactobacilli, can be added. After a ripening, addition of rennet diluted in water can set or coagulate the milk to a smooth thick curd.
After the coagulum reaches the consistency resembling cheddar cheese, it is comminuted, agitated and cooked. The curd may then be drained and cut into blocks. Whey is expelled and drained from the curd. When the curd reaches a predetermined acidity, it is blended in a cheese mill, stretched in hot water, molded, and immersed in brine to cool. Alternatively, the curd may soak in hot water for extraction of lactose before stretching and molding the curd and cooling in brine.
The preparation of curd in traditional mozzarella preparation typically uses thermophilic cultures and the present inventive method may use such cultures in preparing the curd. Since mozzarella manufacturing typically requires higher temperatures than, for example, cheddar manufacture, more heat tolerant thermophilic cultures are desirable. Typically, cheddar is exposed to its highest process temperature, between about 102-103xc2x0 F., when cooked in the curd making process. Mozzarella manufactured according to traditional processes is exposed to higher process temperatures when cooked in the curd making process, and exposed to temperatures between about 140-160xc2x0 F. in the cooking/stretching (molding) process.
Pasta filata cheeses may be hard (cured, aged or ripened for 2-12 months), such as provolone, or soft (fresh, moist), such as mozzarella. The present inventive method can prepare both hard and soft pasta filata cheeses. Preparation of natural pasta filata, such as mozzarella, has typically required that standardization of fat level be done to the milk, before forming the curd. Until the present invention, cooking and stretching the curd in hot water has been considered necessary to impart to the cheese its characteristic stringy appearance and the stretch typically associated with melted or baked pasta filata cheeses, such as mozzarella cheese. Perhaps the most popular and most familiar pasta filata cheese to U.S. consumers is mozzarella cheese. FDA standards classify mozzarella cheese into mozzarella, low moisture mozzarella, part skim mozzarella, and low moisture part skim mozzarella. The method of this invention may prepare any of these classifications of cheeses.
Traditional types of processed cheese are generally manufactured by grinding and blending the natural cheese with any needed dry ingredients (such as dry cream, etc.). The ground and blended product is introduced to a processed cheese cooker, and any other ingredients needed (such as anhydrous milk fat, emulsifier, water, salt, etc.) are added. The processed cheese is then pumped (such as by positive displacement) to packaging equipment. The resultant product is a soft-bodied easily meltable processed cheese.
The inventive method differs from traditional methods of making pasta filata in that much of the standardization of the fat-level takes place in the curd blenders. The inventive method uses either fresh or aged curd. The inventive method may add emulsifiers and other traditional cheese-making ingredients, if desired. An advantage of the inventive method that either minimal or no emulsifier need be added to the processed cheese cooker and that no other ingredients need be added to the processed cheese cooker. The inventive method uses direct steam for cooking and stretching, instead of hot water. It is an advantage of the present process to use a typical processed blender and a typical processed cheese cooker to prepare the pasta filata cheese. However, the method of this invention may use any other method of blending the curd and melting the curd using direct steam. The present invention blends and melts the curd just until forming an evenly melted product with none of the typical pasta filata individual strands. The present method molds the cheese by pumping or extruding the melted curd from the processed cheese cooker and filling various size packages. The filled packages cool in a blast cooler with sufficient air circulation. Salt can be added to the cheese either in the blender or in the processed cheese cooker, instead of using the traditional brine cooling and salting method. The inventive process may also use traditional molding and brining of the cheese, if desired, but eliminating brine cooling achieves distinct cost savings, as will be more fully explained further herein.